Easy Gingerbread House

Every Christmas, my kids beg me to get a Gingerbread House kit. Being a baker, I didn’t like the idea of buying a kit, and I felt a bit overwhelmed at the thought of building a house!

Until I saw a Gingerbread House cookie in the back of a recent Better Home and Gardens magazine, and thought, “Hmmm, I could do that.”

This Gingerbread House is so simple! You can make the houses any size you want. It’s the perfect activity for a Christmas party at school since the kids are limited by the room on the house. No worries about transporting these houses home from school!

How to Make the Gingerbread House Cookies

Supplies

Gingerbread cookie dough
House shaped cookie cutter or shape cut out of cardstock/file folder.
Parchment paper
Tray or plates for decorating on

To make the dough for the cookies, I used my favorite gingerbread cookie dough from Martha Stewart. The making is a little fussy since you need to heat some of the ingredients on the stove before adding them to the batter. I recommend making the cookie dough and baking the cookies the day before you plan to decorate them. This gives the cookies plenty of time to cool before being handled by little hands.

Since I didn’t have a big enough cookie cutter on hand, I drew a simple house shape on a file folder and cut it out. I laid the shape on the rolled out cookie dough and cut out the shapes with a paring knife.

Frugal Tip

To save washing the cookie sheets after baking, I always cover my cookie sheets with parchment paper. Since most cookies do not stain the parchment paper, I can use the pieces for a long time before tossing them.

I baked the cookies at 350 degreees and monitored the time. The bigger the cookies the more baking time you’ll need. Most of my gingerbread house cookies needed an extra 3 to 5 minutes. Check the middle of the cookie for doneness to be sure they’re ready.

Decorating the Gingerbread House

Now for the fun part! And the messy part. I like to set up cookie decorating sessions in my kitchen where it’s easy to clean up the floor. Not to mention the kitchen sink is handy for sticky hands.

Decorations

You’ll find lots of great decorations in a variety of stores. I find ours at CVS in the candy aisle. The dollar store also has a good selection.

Mini marshmallows

Mini candy canes

Red, white, and green royal icing

Chocolate chips

Mini red candies

Gum drops

Kit kat

Red, yellow, and green sprinkles

Cookie Decorating Set Up

I put the gingerbread house cookies on plates for the kids. The plates help contain the mess a bit, and make it easy to transport the cookies to another spot without dropping them.

I set the decorations up in small bowls in the middle of the table along with a few spoons for scooping. If you do this activity in a classroom, I would have the kids use the spoons to prevent the spread of germs.

Meet Barb

Barb Hoyer has written 4364 posts.

After working in the fundraising world for over ten years, Barb is an avid runner, writer, photographer, parent volunteer, and lover of dictionaries and thesauruses. Wife to an engineer and mom to 5 kids, Barb lives in the suburbs of Philly. Her idea of relaxation is an afternoon on the couch with a stack of books.

Comments

I love gingerbread houses. I remember having all the grandchildren over one year just to make some houses. Thank you for sharing your link on our new link up. We look forward to seeing you next week @ Mum-bo MondayJennifer Abel recently posted..ICYMI: there are 18,000+ NEW .xyz domain names

I have to admit, I clicked on this, because I saw the word “easy”. Yep, it does look easy. Wish I would have seen this before we spent 2 hours doing ours yesterday. We used the boxes and yes, the kids loved them, but they are DIFFICULT! Definitely trying this version next year. Thanks for sharing!

This is great! With my little kids I’ve been overwhelmed at the thought of a whole gingerbread house. This lets each of them get their own little house, and makes it easier for me! Thanks for such a great idea. Kaylene recently posted..Holiday Traditions

I love making gingerbread houses. I am a baker too and never buy the box set. Once I even used graham crackers bc I just couldn’t find the time to make it and it worked so well. Super cute! Stopping by from the learning to blog party Kristin @ MOMentous Moms recently posted..Favorite Fridays: Electronic Device

I have good and slightly hilariously silly memories making gingerbread with a friend while both of our kids were either crawling about, crying, or for the shortest time possible sleeping! All part of the holiday fun, though, and they look great

Love making gingerbread houses with the kids. My daughter just made one and her brothers already destroyed and ate the roof off…lol. I may have to make some of these and have the boys decorate their own house cookies.Erlene recently posted..Merry Monday Link Party #32

Hey Barb! Just stopping in to let you know that your easy gingerbread house recipe is my featured pick from last week’s Teach Me Tuesday Linky Party:) I also featured them on my 1st Christmas Round Up post! This recipe is a life saver to me!Adrian recently posted..1st Christmas Round Up

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